GarageTone Axle Grease Delay
Reviewed by:
Noslo13, on november 04, 2010 1 of 1 people found this review helpful

Price paid: $ 70

Purchased from: Russo's Guitar Center

Ease of Use: The GarageTone series of effects pedals is Visual Sound's attempt at making solid tone affordable for everyone. This is the first pedal of their's I decided to buy, and so far I am quite pleased with it. It is very easy to use, just three knobs and the button to turn it on and off. The time knob controls the time between repeats, the repeat knob controls how many repeats there are, and the level knob controls the volume of the repeats. It doesn't take much time and effort to find a good setting for any kind of music if you just play with it. The "manual" was just one sheet of paper with a few recommended settings, but the controls are so simple, it's easy to figure out how to get the sound you want. // 9

Sound: I'm playing the pedal at home with my Squire Affinity Strat and Peavey Bandit 112 amp. I know some of you will stop reading at that, but at the store I played it with an American Standard HSS Strat and some mid-range Marshall product, I don't recall the model. On both setups I was struck by the quality of the pedal. In store I was playing it next to an Ibanez AD9, DigiTech DL-8, and MXR M169. Against all those pedals the GarageTone held up well. It was most similar in sound to the Ibanez AD9, which costs about twice as much. I did notice that with too much gain and too many repeats the pedal just makes this banshee-like scream, but you can do some pretty cool things with that by messing with the knobs on it, without even touching the guitar. I have yet to dial it in perfectly to match any particular artist, but I think it should be quite possible. Sound gets an 7/10, but compared to the pedal's price, it's an amazing value. // 7

Reliability & Durability: The pedal itself is made of .16 gauge steel, and the power button feels nice and solid. I doubt it would have any durability problems unless you were trying to break it. It runs on one 9V battery, which isn't that much of a problem. I would feel confident gigging with it without a backup. // 9

Overall Impression: I play many different styles, but I focus on hard rock like Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple, older metal like Black Sabbath, and I also dabble in classical music for fun. The pedal suits those genres quite well, and I think it should work well for others as well. It sounds good clean and dirty. I've been playing for three years and this is my first delay pedal, and I am very glad that I bought it. I'd buy another in a heartbeat if something happened to it. I think my favourite thing about it is its ease of use and affordability. There are not many things I can think of to improve the pedal. It does its job well. // 9

GarageTone Axle Grease Delay
Reviewed by:
oogah33, on march 01, 2012 0 of 0 people found this review helpful

Price paid: C$ 70

Purchased from: Long & McQuade

Ease of Use: This pedal is actually very easy to use. It has 3 knobs: Time, Repeats, and Level. It's all pretty self-explanatory. Time is how much time delayed between each note, repeats is how many times the delay is repeated, and level is how much depth the delay has. The only complaint I would have is that since there are no ways of marking where the knobs are set (numbers and such), it can be difficult to remember where you last set the knobs for a particular song or solo. Other than that, it's a pretty basic pedal that's quite easy to understand. // 9

Sound: I play a Les Paul Studio through a Vox VT-40+. This pedal is a great deal for the price. It's extremely quiet for the most part. The only problem (in my opinion) with this pedal is that it will begin to make those alien-like sounds you get some pedals when you put the time and repeats all the way up. This is strictly based on opinion, however. The effect in itself is great! It gives that basic delay with a little bit of reverb in the background. This fits my needs, but if you need a pedal with longer delay (longer than about 2-3 seconds) intervals, this pedal probably won't please you. // 9

Reliability & Durability: It looks like this pedal is very reliable. So far, I've only used it once on stage, but it seems like it could take a beating. It's just a simple metal box with knobs and a foot switch. I, personally, tend to be pretty gentle with my pedals, so I probably wouldn't know how it would work with an aggressive stomp-er. For the price I paid, it's quite reliable. I don't use a backup, but I would suggest one just in case the area you're gigging at doesn't have an available outlet. This pedal doesn't use a battery at all. // 8

Overall Impression: I play a lot of rock. Whether that be classic rock or modern, this pedal generally does what I want it to do. If this pedal were stolen, I'd probably go buy another one. It's not too expensive and it does all I need it to do. I really like the way the delay sounds with the reverb in this pedal. There's not too much I don't like about this pedal, but I do wish it number markings around the knobs. I compared it with other low-mid end pedals such as the Boss DD-3. I ended up choosing this one because it fit my needs at the cheapest price. Though it is a lot to expect from a low budget pedal, I would have loved it if it had a "tap" feature. // 9